Rating

Mike & Ike were totally absent from my childhood, like a pair of dysfunctional friends who said they’d site with me during lunch but didn’t. I got my first taste of Mike & Ike during high school and was annoyed as to what I was missing out on all these years. I have been a faithful devotee to the regular mix and it wasn’t until recently I branched out into the other flavor offerings. The Tangy Twister mix with its cheery bright orange box and promising flavors begged to be first in line.

I was so looking forward to trying this Tangy Twister blend because of the pineapple flavor. So when I brought my movie sized box home and opened it up to eat I discovered that I had one pineapple in the whole box. Talk about disappointed!

Cherry: Very tart and oddly enough, reads as a “candy” cherry flavor but not as a bad “medicinal” one. The sourness lingers so the sweetness typical of Mike & Ike didn’t really last for very long.

Raspberry: A really nice raspberry flavor that has a strong juiciness to it with good floral and fruity notes. It’s not too tart, but just enough for it to taste authentic. It was nice how this mimicked the way real berries always have that little sourness before turning sweet.

Orange Punch: Oh, this is strange. It does taste fruity but not of oranges. It is very punch-like with a tropical essence to it as if passion fruit and limes were in there. Maybe it’s labeled orange because of the color?

Pineapple: Wow, This one is so extremely good. It tastes exactly like pineapple with a burst of zesty sweetness and a slight pine-y bite to it. Simply amazing. I need to buy another box to get more of these. I’m not kidding.

Apple: Tart, juicy and is very zesty and a little sweet. A nice sour apple flavor that isn’t overly artificial.

I liked this mix and will certainly pick it up again. I’m just hoping my flavor mix is a little more even next time.

Last year Brach’s, my favorite brand for candy corn, surprised us all with new flavor varieties of this iconic fall candy: Milk Maid Caramel Apple and Milk Mail Caramel. I reviewed these last year when I was writing for CandyAddict, and you can see my impressions of them there. I was pleased to find in my local Target that Brach’s is continuing the tradition and released a new flavor: Milk Maid Chocolate Caramel Candy Corn.

The candy corn still smells sweet, but now there’s a really strong buttery smell to them. The kernels are really pretty to Different shades of
The flavor is very interesting. It’s immediately sweet and the flavor is immediately the caramel. It comes across as a very intense, salty, fake, buttery flavor. The cocoa appears in the finish and aftertaste working hard to mellow out the strength of the butter flavor. I know it sounds odd, but this works. The caramel and cocoa flavors match well and neither come across as overpowering. My only criticism is that the caramel has a stronger presence than the cocoa, but I can live with this.

I love candy corn to begin with, so these will be a nice addition to my eating rotation so things won’t get too boring.

This is a very unique candy bar, in case you couldn’t already tell from the image. It’s a Hershey’s chocolate bar from China filled with a green tea creamy center. Since I do not read Chinese, I was confused as to what this bar was at first. The image on the front shows a green filling in the center and some green leaves. They’re meant to be tea leaves but I think they could be easily mistaken for mint leaves I think.

The format of the bar is made of of six filled sections, each rectangular and molded with the Hershey’s name on top. Appearance wise, it look likes all the other filled Hershey’s bars you can get here in the United States. The bar smells terribly sweet and milky, more so than other Hershey bars from what I can recall. The whole bar is very soft and easily breakes apart. The green tea filling looks creamy and has a good, pale green color. Anything brighter would have looked too artificial.

The flavor is really nice. Surprisingly the chocolate flavor, or it’s sweetness, doesn’t overpower the tea. The tea tastes grassy and sweet. It definitely tastes like green tea from China, as it lacks the intensity and bitterness of Japanese matcha. The chocolate appears as a flavor toward the end and has good notes of milk and sugar. The texture is smooth and creamy without being greasy.

This bar is impressive in it’s zen like balance of textures and flavors; everything is working in harmony. Why doesn’t Hershey’s execute this bar for us in the United States? Please?

I honestly can’t remember when I first had Bit-O-Honey. Or where I first saw of them or where I first heard of them. It was as if “Bam!” one day I saw them and due to the “unfamiliarity default”, I bought them to try. I believe part of the reason I finally noticed them was the fact that I’d recently discovered one of my favorite bars, Big Hunk, and Bit-O-Honey seemed like it’d be something similar.

Bit-O-Honey is described as a honey flavored taffy with bits of almonds blended in. From what I’ve seen, you can either find them in bar form or in bite sized pieces like I have shown here. I prefer getting the bag simply because it allows me to get more of a good thing. But in the end, it’s the flavor that matters and not how it’s packaged. Bit-O-Honey has quite a bit of history behind it as well, as it first hit shelves in 1924 and was eventually acquired by Nestle in the 1980s. It looks like Nestle was eager to include this enduring classic into its repertoire.

Smells sweet and lightly of nuts. The texture is sooooo nice. It’s dense and firm, yet is easily bitten into. The chew takes some working in the mouth but it never is a threat to your teeth and/or fillings. I’d like to think of it as a Starburst on steriods. And the flavor? Sweet, creamy with a smooth flavor of honey and almonds. It’s not intense like the flavor of marzipan, it’s much milder and reminds me more of a nougat in a Zero bar. Just enough flavor to compliment the sweetness and texture. I don’t really feel the almonds in the texture of the bar, but I prefer it that way. I hate getting nuts caught in my teeth.

I love these. They may not push Big Hunk from my favorite nougat/taffy bar, but they come in a close second. I’ll have have room for these in my stash.

Some great chocolates you seek out on your own and others are thrust upon you as gifts. That was the case with these adorable bonbons from Asher’s Chocolates. I enjoy seeking out chocolates on my own since I know what my tastes are and how I feel like catering to them. Yet, it’s always so nice to try something new thanks to the thoughtfulness from a special someone. Not only is the surprise nice, but I also don’t admit to knowing everything out there in the great wide chocolate world. I do need to rely on other’s experiences and recommendations from time to time.

Asher’s is a chocolate company based in Philadelphia where they rose from humble beginnings back before the turn of the 20th century. Their story is similar to that of See’s Candies, a family run business that prided itself in making excellent confections. Asher’s is actually the oldest family owned candy making company in the Unites States and are being run by the fourth generation at the moment. It’s great to see a family so interested in their sweet traditions.

I was given a sampler pack of their milk and dark bonbons:

Mint: The dark chocolate is nice and rich and thankfully not too sweet. The mint has a nice freshness without being overpowering, which is a lot of my problem with minty and chocolate combinations. The texture of the ganache is smooth, creamy and just heavenly.

Peanut Butter Cup: The peanut butter is creamier, richer, and sweeter than the crumbly, dry standard of Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups. The milk chocolate is very smooth and sweet. Paired with the nutty, slightly salty peanut butter it makes one addictive little treat.

Coconut:Very sweet. The coconut is moist with a good dense, chewy texture. The full coconut flakes are still intact and I love chewing them. I consider this to be a more decadent version of a Mounds bar.

Peanut Butter Bonbon: Like the cup version but since the size ratios are different, it comes off as denser, sweeter, richer…Yum!

Marshmallow: Very, very mellow in flavor. The marshmallow is fresh and tastes lightly vanilla. The chocolate delivers most of the flavor and it’s very creamy and sweet.

These were certainly a step above of the other chocolate confections of this type, and the best of this kind I’ve had in a long time. Freshness was a big contributor, but I also feel the quality flavors and chocolate played a big part too. I look forward to visiting their retail store someday to try what other delights Asher’s has to offer.

Rating: WIll Buy Again (Even though I didn’t buy it the first time, haha)